Tuesday, December 22, 1998 Published at 11:45 GMTUK PoliticsA history of Christmas scandal pastThe festive season has seen the downfall of many politiciansChristmas and New Year are supposed to bring peace and goodwill to all.

But many politicians have seen their careers collapse and their private lives picked over like leftover turkey during those weeks.

This year has had its own seasonal upset - Trade Secretary Peter Mandelson is accused of a conflict of interest in having received a £373,000 loan from Paymaster General Geoffrey Robinson, whom his department is investigating.

But a look back through the years shows Mr Mandelson is far from alone in having to face hostile allegations during the festive season.

Disraeli's debts

In December 1825, the City suffered a devastating crash and a young Benjamin Disraeli was ruined.

The future prime minister owed thousands of pounds in debt and spent the next few decades avoiding those he owed money to.

As a result, Mr Disraeli wrote Vivian Grey, an anonymous novel which so closely parodied his friends and associates it resulted in several threats of duels.

Parnell's ruin

On December 24 1889, Captain O'Shea filed for divorce from his wife Kitty.

Charles Parnell: Lover's husband filed for divorce on Christmas Eve

Kitty O'Shea had for many years been the lover of Charles Stewart Parnell, the Irish nationalist hero.

The most conspicuous figure in Irish politics, Mr Parnell had met Kitty O'Shea in 1880.

Two daughters, believed to be Mr Parnell's, were born in 1883 and 1884.

Mr Parnell had been a pivotal figure in both Irish and British politics up until the divorce, but on gaining the woman he loved he lost his political reputation.

There were calls for Mr Parnell to resign and in December 1890 45 members of the Irish parliamentary party left him to begin their own party with a new leader.

Rustling in the bushes

December 1958 saw the end of Tory minister Ian Harvey's political career.

The MP for Harrow East and a foreign office minister was caught in bushes with a Coldstream Guardsman in St James's Park a month earlier after a policeman and park keeper heard rustling noises.

On the way to the police station, Mr Harvey even tried to make a run for it, but was recaptured and on arrival, he attempted to give a false name.

Both were charged with gross indecency and breaching the park's regulations.

When the pair appeared in court on 10 December, the gross indecency charge was dropped and both were fined £5.

After Mr Harvey resigned he was excluded by the party and became a social outcast from his society clubs.

Dead or alive

On Christmas Eve 1974 the news that Labour MP John Stonehouse was alive hit the headlines.

Mr Stonehouse had left behind a wife, a daughter, a mistress and a mountain of debts when he faked his death leaving a pile of clothes on a beach Reggie Perrin style.

Unfortunately, the Australian police who captured the fugitive former minister were disappointed they had discovered a politician and not Lord Lucan.

Two years later Mr Stonehouse was convicted to seven years imprisonment on 18 counts of theft, fraud and deception.

Parking row

Maureen Colquhoun, Britain's first openly lesbian MP, punched a car park attendant in a row about a parking ticket in December 1974.

After years of notoriety in the house, she was deselected in 1977,

New Years Baby

On New Year's Eve 1983 Flora Keays was born, the daughter of now Lord Cecil Parkinson and his then secretary Sara Keays.

Lord Parkinson: Fell from grace

Cecil Parkinson had enjoyed a speedy rise through the party but during the annual conference that came to a standstill following the announcement that his secretary of 12 years was carrying his child.

Three weeks prior to the Blackpool conference, the father to be had resigned as party chairman after guiding Mrs Thatcher's Conservative party to a second victory.

Yeo Ho Ho

On Boxing Day 1993, the tabloids led with the news married environment minister Tim Yeo had a six-month-old "love child" to single mother and Tory councillor Julia Stent.

Tim Yeo: Hit the headlines in 1993

The News of the World ran the story during the quiet festive period and after two weeks of headlines such as "Yeo Ho Ho", Mr Yeo resigned from his position.

Mr Yeo was one in a string of scandal's which followed John Major's "back to basics" campaign.

Some weeks later, newspapers printed the story that the MP had fathered another child many years ago as a Cambridge student. The daughter had been given up for adoption.

Mr Yeo was by no means the first casualty of "back to basics", or the last.

Underage relationship

Three years later, shortly after new year 1997, Jerry Hayes, the MP for Harlow, was the subject of The News of the World's "Tory MP two timed wife with underage gay lover".

Mr Hayes claimed the relationship was purely platonic.

Many believe the story broke because of another "family values" campaign by John Major. But the story had been hatched over Christmas with the MP's former lover Paul Stone and publicist Max Clifford.

Minister's son sold drugs

William Straw: Exposed on Christmas Eve

On Christmas Eve last year it was not an MP who hit the headlines but the unnamed son of a top politician who was accused of selling cannabis to a journalist.

A frenzy of speculation rapidly descended into legal farce as court orders were imposed preventing the media from reporting that the minister was Mr Straw and the alleged dealer his 17-year-old son William.

But, once freed by the courts to speak openly a week after the news broke, Mr Straw won admiration for his honest approach to the family crisis.

He had taken William to a police station where he confessed all. The teenager was later given a caution.